Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part IV

Hi Friends,

Welcome to the final episode of Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part IV.  Last time we left our hero he'd just created a volume in the easy to use Nimble Storage GUI.  Today I'm going to take that volume and add it to an ESXi box that is being managed by VMware vCenter.

The first thing we need to do is set up a relationship between the Nimble Storage and the ESXi box.  Think of yourself as the matchmaker setting up a blind date.  Nimble Storage, meet ESXi.  ESXi, meet Nimble Storage.  And you as the matchmaker, if you don't make any typos, will be responsible for a wonderful match!

1.  Go into the Nimble Storage GUI, click on Manage and Initiator Groups.

 2.  We're going to create a new Initiator Group and add an initiator to the group.  Click on New Initiator Group.

 3.  Give the Initiator group a name and click on the Add Initiator button.

4.  Head over to vCenter to get the iSCSI iqn of the ESXi machine.  Click on the Configuration tab
and Storage Adapters link.  Highlight the iSCSI Software Adapter and copy the iSCSI Name.

5.  Head back to the Nimble Storage GUI and paste it into the Initiator Name.  After you click OK, you can add more initiators if you need to.

6.  I now have a new initiator group with one initiator in it.

7.  The Nimble array now knows about ESXi, but we need to introduce ESXi to Nimble.  Remember that Target Discovery IP Address we assigned in a previous blog?  Copy that guy down and let's head back to ESXi.

8.  Click on the Properties link under the details area for the iSCSI adapter.  There are a couple of tabs we need to provide data in.  First click on the Network Configuration tab and add the VMkernel Adapters that are on the same network as your iSCSI volumes that you want to use for data.

9.  Next click on the Dynamic Discovery tab.  Remember that IP address you copied down?  Put that here.  You're completing the introductions for the blind date and after a rescan the storage should be available for use.

10.  Next we'll add the storage and create a datastore so vCenter can use the new storage.  Click on the Configuration tab, on the Storage link and then Add Storage.

11.  Select Disk/LUN.

12.  If you have other iSCSI volumes on the same data network and they're not choosey when it comes to access, you might see more than your volume.  Be careful not to select a volume that's not yours.  Take a look at the Path ID and you'll see the name of the volume in it.  Here you can see "neil-test" in the Path ID, that's the volume we created.

13.  Choose either VMFS-5 or VMFS-3.

14.  Take a look at the Current Disk Layout.  If this is a brand new volume, there shouldn't be anything there.  Remember, be careful when you selected the volume not to use a volume that's not yours.

15.  Give the new datastore a name.

16.  Choose how much of the space you'd like this datastore to consume.  Here I'm using the maximum available.

17.  Review everything and make sure you're happy.  When you're happy click Finish.

18.  Hurray, you now have a new datastore to use!

I hope you enjoyed this series as much as I did writing it!  Always remember there are many different ways to get to the finish line, so my way is just *a* way, not the only way. :-)

Look for more blogs coming soon!

Until Next Time,
-Brain

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part I

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part II

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part III

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part III

Hi Friends,

Welcome to the next blog on Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part III.  Today I'm going to show you how easy it is to create a volume and setup up snapshots to protect your new volume.

Yesterday I stopped at the password entry screen.  Once you've entered your password you'll come to the home screen which provides all kinds of great information and metrics.  Mine is pretty boring because I just set it up.

The cool thing is you'll notice, no RAID setup, it's already been setup and optimized for you!  Nimble Storage uses dual parity RAID, so you get the benefits of RAID 10 without the extra drives of RAID 10!

On to the volume creation!

1.  On the top of the screen you've got a bunch of choices, but we're going to click on Manage and then select Volumes.

 2.  Click on the New Volume button.

 3.  Give the volume a name.  Now I'd like to focus your attention to a couple of really cool features.  Take a look at Performance Policy.  What's that you ask?  Head to step 4.

 4.  Performance Policy is super cool especially to a VDI guy like me, since I'm always concerned about block size!  Here you can adjust the block size to what your application is using.  I can't get over how cool that is!  Take a look below.  Nimble gives you a bunch of pre-created options that are already optimized for certain applications.  Well, what if your application isn't on this list, or you want to select something special just for your application?  Step 5!  :-)

5.  You can select 4, 8, 16 or 32KB and you can specify if you want compression and/or caching turned on.  And if you don't want to have to mess with any of this you can just select "default".  As seen in step 3.

6.  Once you've selected your Performance Policy, you select your access controls.  The nice thing about this is you can be as selective or open as you want with permissions to your iSCSI volumes.  If you want every machine can have access or just certain machines or just one.  Very, pardon the pun, nimble.  Now select if you'd like to allow multiple initiator access.

7.  Select the size you'd like your volume to be and whether this volume is thin provisioned how much data can be put onto the volume, warnings, snapshot reserves and snapshot warnings.  This is personal preference, so experiment a bit to see what works best for you.

8.  Now we'll protect our volume.  If it's just a test and you don't care about snapshots, just select None, but if it is something you'd like to protect you have a few choices here.  If you've already created a volume collection group for protecting, you can assign it here.  If you'd like to create a new volume collection because you're going to be creating similar volumes or something like that, you can select create new volume collection.  If it's just a single volume that you'd like protected, go ahead and select protect as a standalone volume.  By creating volume collections, you can easily add new volumes to existing volume collections, but again, choose what works best for you.

9.  Here I'm selecting a new volume collection.  You can select pre-created protection templates or create your own.  The synchronization feature is really awesome.  For example, you can select VMware vCenter, put in your credentials and the array will work with vCenter to quiesce those virtual machines for you before a snapshot is created.  Makes sense right?  Why is this unbelievably cool?  If you've ever been in charge of backups you'll understand because the last thing a backup administrator wants to get is the error that some files/machines could not be backed up because there were files open!

10.  Next you'll create your schedule of backups, when, what time, how often and if you want to replicate those snapshots to another array.

11.  Click Finish and your volume is created!  Here I'm back at the Volumes page, you can see the neil-test volume has been created.

I not only enjoy how easy it is to create the volume, but also the choices I'm given.  If I want to just take defaults I can zoom through the process.  I can also be very particular and take my time customizing my volume exactly the way I want it.  Another extremely useful feature is the helpful tips displayed on the menus as you go along.  It's super easy and the tips put the icing on the cake by explaining what feature you're setting and how it works.

That's it for today friends.  Tomorrow I'll focus on iSCSI initiators and getting the newly created volume into ESXi.

Until Next Time!
-Brain

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part I

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part II

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part IV

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part II

Hi Friends,

Hope you had a great weekend!  I spent mine doing my favorite thing, being a slug.  Today's blog is Part II of Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It!  In the last blog I showed you how to get the Nimble array on the network and I ended telling you the next blog would cover volume creation...  Well, I lied. :-)  Today's topic is setting up data networks, DNS, Time, and other good stuff.  Sorry about that, I'll get to volume creation soon!

Okay, enough groveling.  Now that you've got your Nimble array on your network, let's do some advanced setup steps!

1.  Open up an internet browser and type in the address you gave the management network for the Nimble array.  You'll be greeted by a Nimble Storage widow, enter in the password you gave the array.

2.  Now, choose how you'd like to setup your network.  Choose wisely....  Nah, just kidding, you can always change things later!

3.  First enter in the IP address you'd like to use iSCSI to discover all of your volumes on and the subnet mask.  For the other ports you've got lots of choices, but here I'm using a private network only for data.  If you want to use jumbo frames, here's where you set it.  Next give the array a couple of IP addresses for diagnostic purposes.

4.  Enter in the domain name your array will be part of and DNS servers to use.

5.  Select the time zone your array is in and the NTP server you'd like it to get it's time from.

6.  Let's talk support.  We've got a great group of people here waiting to help you out if you need it and your array has the ability to call home when it's not happy, let us help you!  In this screen you enter who's emailing, who receives the emails, what SMTP server, whether to use http proxy to send the emails and most importantly to send Nimble Support an email.

7.  That's it!  Now you're ready to start carving up storage.

I hope you enjoyed today's blog!  Tomorrow, hopefully, I'll be showing you how to carve up those volumes!

Until Next Time!

-Brain

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part I

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part III

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part IV

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part I

Hi Friends,

I'm back from my hiatus and ready to share some great new stuff with you!  Today I'm going to start a new series, Nimble Storage - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It!  Today I'm going to show you how easy it is to get your Nimble array on your network.

So you got your brand new Nimble array, racked it and plugged in an ethernet cable into eth1 that you want to be your management network.  Now what?!

It's super easy you can go about it in a few ways.

1.  Hook up your PC with a serial cable and use the CLI to configure.
2.  Use a Keyboard Video Mouse console and use the CLI to configure.
3.  Use the Nimble Setup Manager tool and configure with a GUI from the comfort of your desk.

Now I don't know about you, but I'm lazy, don't like the noise of datacenters and have come to appreciate GUI's these days. :-)

Got your eth1 plugged into your management network?  Excellent!

Here's what you have to do.

1.  Download the Nimble Setup Manager from InfoSight.  What you haven't been to InfoSight?  You've gotta check it out!  This page will give you more information about what it is.  Once you're there, click on the InfoSight link at the top.

 

2.  Install on a Windows box on the same physical subnet as the management network you have plugged into eth1 on your array.  Also, make sure you have Adobe Flash Player and if this box doesn't have access to the internet, install Bonjour Print Services for Windows.  (Thanks Phil!)

3.  Launch Nimble Setup Manager and it will go find your new array!  How cool is that?

4.  Select the array you want to configure and click Next.
5.  Next you'll need to have some network information regarding that management network to give to your new array.

Here we enter in the Array Name, Management IP, Subnet Mask, Default Gateway and a password.

6.  Guess what?  You're done!  Well not done done, but now you can access your array from the management network to setup your volumes and all from the comfort of your cube.  Just go to a browser and enter in the IP address you gave the management network and you'll be able to do all your administration from the GUI.  Now if you're a CLI fan, never fear, you can SSH to that IP and configure from there as well!

Next time I'll show you how easy it is to create volumes and make them seen by ESXi.

Until Next Time Friends!
-Brain

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part II

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part III

Nimble Storage Setup - So Easy, Even *I* Can Do It! - Part IV

Where's Neil?

Hi Friends,

Sorry, for not writing for awhile, I've been on a short hiatus.  Look for new and exciting blogs coming soon!

-Brain

Random Ramblings of Neil - Why VDI?

Hi Friends,

Thought I'd try something new, the random ramblings of me.  If you've stuck with me this far, maybe you'll stick around a little longer.  I figured I'd start babbling about what's on my mind.  So why VDI?  I think a lot of folks are finding out that VDI is tough!  Server virtualization was fairly easy because servers are predictable, and unless they get viruses, they pretty much are content to do their jobs, day in, day out without much variation.

Now people on the other hand!  We're horrible, we don't work 24 hours a day, we don't stay on task, we take breaks, we go to websites that aren't business related, pick up viruses from naughty sites, we drop our computers, leave them in car to cook and potentially get stolen, download software our employers don't want us to, delete files on our computers we're not supposed to.  Wow, we're pretty chaotic!

I get the question a lot, why VDI?  It tends to be expensive, server administrators don't want it because they're afraid they'll be handed desktop support and the desktop administrators don't want it because they're afraid they'll lose their jobs to the server administrators.  With server virtualization it was all about consolidation and saving money and I don't think VDI is trying to solve that same problem.  Unfortunately a lot of folks immediately equate VDI with server virtualization and saving money and consolidating.

Maybe we're trying to solve a whole different problem, one that people forget about all the time.  Intellectual property, also known as YOU!  If you think about it, hardware is throw away, but people are invaluable!  What's trapped in our heads makes business successful.  So we need to architect a solution, not around the predictable server, but the chaotic human.  So how about some solutions!

1.  Let's get that data off a local disk and put it somewhere safe!  But Neil, I'm already running CIFS shares and have a utility that let's user's backup their desktop!  Ah, very good point, but take a poll of your users how many are actually running their backups and/or backing up to their CIFS share?  How many have gone to IT with a dead laptop hard drive and have lost everything?  How many have left their laptops in their car and it walked off?  Remember, once that data is gone it may not be gone.  If stolen, that data might show up in the wrong hands.  What about the damage to your companies reputation?  What if there was customer data on that laptop, like credit card numbers?

2.  Give the user what they need, not what you think they need and they'll love it!  One size does NOT fit all.  If your users can run their desktop on their tablet or ANY computer, they're going to like the solution!  If they accidentally delete OS files they're not supposed to and the OS crashes and a simple reboot will fix the problem automagically, they're going to like the solution!  So how do we know what the user needs?  I've mentioned it before, perform an assessment.  You may think your users only need 20 IOPS, maybe they do, maybe they don't.  What about block size?  What about reads vs. writes?  Remember, you're introducing something new to your users.  If it doesn't perform just as good or better than what they're used to, you'll never hear the end of it!  Do the users need to install applications or is a certain set good enough?  There's lots of great technologies out there.  My suggestion, figure out what your users need before you purchase anything.

I think VDI is cool.  Is it tough?  Yes, but it solves a lot of problems and can make your user's lives easier, IF done right.  In other ramblings I'll talk about what *I* think is right. :-)

Until Next Time!
-Brain

VAAI for Dummies - AKA VAAI for Me! - Part V - Statistics!

Happy Friday Friends!

In previous articles I showed you how to tell if VAAI functions were on, but how do you know if they're working?  A good way is to take a look at statistics from ESXtop on ESXi and from the controllers.  Let's first have a look at ESXtop.

To get there, log into one of your ESXi machines that will be performing the VAAI offloads:

1.  Type esxtop
2.  Type u
3.  Next you can select what you want ESXtop to display, so type f and then b, f, g, i and o.  This will remove b,f,g and i and add o to the list of what's monitored.
4.  Hit enter to return back to the statistics.
Sorry for the size of the image, I know it's hard to see.  If you click on it you'll get the original size.

 So what do the statistics mean?

1.  CLONE_RD - Number of full copy reads
2.  CLONE_WR - Number of full copy writes
3.  CLONE_F - Number of failed full copies
4.  MBC_RD/s - Throughput of full copy reads in megabytes per second
5.  MBC_WR/s - Throughput of full copy writes in megabytes per second
6.  ATS - Number of successful locks
7.  ATSF - Number of failed locks
8.  ZERO - Number of successful block zero commands
9.  ZERO_F - Number of failed block zero commands
10.  MBZERO/s - Throughput of block zeros in megabytes per second
11.  DELETE - Number of successful unmap commands
12.  DELETE_F - Number of failed unmap commands
13.  MBDELS/s - How much data has been reclaimed

Now how about from the storage controller?  You'll need to go into diag mode, so please do be careful once you're in there.  In 7-Mode type priv set diag to enter diagnostics mode and then stats show vstorage

For Clustered Data ONTAP, enter diag mode by typing set diag and then statistics show -object vstorage  (Again, please be careful in diag mode)

The first number is the value and the second column is deltas.

So when you run your VAAI function, whether copying, provisioning storage, etc. have a window open to the CLI's so you can watch the counters.  If they start incrementing, you not only know VAAI is working, but how well it is.

Have a great weekend friends,

Until Next Time!
-Brain

We're Almost at 10,000!

Hi Friends,

Not sure if you've noticed, but Glick's Gray Matter is almost at 10,000 hits!

It's been an awesome 6 months and I can't thank you enough for visiting my blog!  After all, there's no Glick's Gray Matter without YOU!  So with that being said, I'd love to hear what you'd like more of, less of, etc!  Please comment on this post with your ideas!  Thanks again and I promise to keep bringing you quality blogs!

-Neil (AKA Brain)

VMworld Session Voting is Open!!

Hi Friends,

It's that time of year again, VMworld!!  If you've never been it's quite cool!  I wanted to to let you know that voting for VMworld is now open!  Once you register or login as a previous register at the VMworld site you can vote for sessions.  NetApp has submitted a bunch of sessions and you can filter by using "NetApp".  The big names have put their name in the hat, including ME, and this is where I need your help!  Please vote for the NetApp submissions if you believe they'll be helpful.  My session will be around end user computing and I've partnered up with VMware to talk about all the goodness in VMware Horizon View 5.2 with NetApp.  So if you want to see Brain (AKA Neil) babbling away on stage, cast your vote!

-Brain

VAAI for Dummies - AKA VAAI for Me! - Part IV - Release The Clones!

Hi Everyone,

Today we're going to talk about Fast File Clone or also known as Native Snapshot Support.  This technology is near and dear to my heart since it's a VDI technology!  So Remember how I wrote that article a little while back about how VDI Cloning Can Cost You More Then You Think!?  If you haven't read it, I highly recommend it. :-)  This piece of VAAI technology helps eliminate the extra I/O the storage array needs to perform when using hypervisor snapshots because the snapshot process is now offloaded to the storage array.

So how does this work?  Along with the plugin in ESXi 5.1 you need VMware View Composer 5.2 and you get VMware View Composer Array Integration, or VCAI.  When clones are created both a flat-file and checkpoint file are created.  Instead of a snapshot, like traditional Linked Clones, a NetApp FlexClone is taken of the gold image.  During a refresh operation, the checkpoint file is re-cloned from the storage array so no snapshots are created on the ESXi server.  This also eliminates any 512 byte partial I/O if VMFSsparse is used instead of the new SEsparse.

So create some clones and take a look at the /vmfs/volumes directory.  You'll see there's a flat file that's the size of the original machine and might think, "Hey!  I'm losing all of my space savings using this technology instead of Linked Clones."  Ah, very perceptive my friends, but remember this is an NFS technology and these are thin provisioned clones which point back to the gold image, so only the changes actually take up any space!

NetApp has had the ability to create VDI FlexClones for some time now, but with VCAI, you don't have to use two separate tools anymore.  In the past, clones had to be created with VSC in vCenter and although you could import automatically if you wanted, you still could not do this functionality from View directly.  Now, from within View, choose to create Automated Linked Clones and once you hit Advanced Storage Options, select "Other Options" and "Use native NFS snapshots (VAAI)" and that's it!  Need to Refresh/Recompose, go ahead, it's all integrated now.

NetApp is currently working on certifying the technology and hopefully it will be certified soon!  When I hear the good news I'll be sure to pass it along.

Until Next Time Friends!

-Brain

VAAI for Dummies - AKA VAAI for Me! - Part III - Where's the ON/OFF Switch and Beyond!

Hi Folks,

After reading my blog I thought I would expand a bit on the ON/OFF capabilities and what they actually turn on and off when it comes to VAAI.  I kind of threw a lot out there and wanted to make a little more sense out of the mess I made.  All the stuff I wrote about installing and validating, that's great, but let's talk more about WHAT those on/off switches actually turn on and off.

In most cases this stuff is all on by default and in most cases you won't need to turn it off.  But what if your boss comes to you and says, "Hey prove to me this VAAI stuff works!"  or say you want to try and find a bottleneck, you can turn individual settings on and off to test.  Please do be careful!

Atomic Test and Set (ATS)

This is actually a really cool primitive!  Say you've got a machine on a LUN and you go and make a change.  When the metadata is updating, a SCSI reservation locks the entire LUN.  So while it's locked, no other ESX or ESXi servers can update the metadata.  In small environments this probably won't be a problem since this process is very quick, but as your environment increases in size, you'll be limited by SCSI reservations, how many machines can be stored on a VMFS volume and how many virtual machines can access the same VMFS datastore.  With ATS this issue is practically eliminated which can allow the environment to grow without this potential limitation.

To check the status and enable or disable ATS use the following commands at the CLI:

Status:

# esxcli system settings advanced list -o /VMFS3/HardwareAcceleratedLocking

Disable:

# esxcli system settings advanced set -i 0 -o /VMFS3/HardwareAcceleratedLocking

Enable:

# esxcli system settings advanced set -i 1 -o /VMFS3/HardwareAcceleratedLocking

XCOPY

Another very cool primitive!   Say you're copying a virtual machine or moving one from one datastore to another.  In the past ESX or ESXi had to read every block and than copy or move it.  While this function works just fine it does require more compute and network resources from the ESX/ESXi servers.  The extended copy tells the storage which blocks to copy or move and the storage goes and does it.  This lowers the demand on the compute and network resources while speeding up the copy or move.

To check the status and enable or disable extended copy for cloning use the following commands at the CLI:

Status:

# esxcli system settings advanced list -o /DataMover/HardwareAcceleratedMove

Disable:

# esxcli system settings set -i 0 -o /DataMover/HardwareAcceleratedMove

Enable:

# esxcli system settings set -i 1 -o /DataMover/HardwareAcceleratedMove

Write_Same

Yep another cool one.  Okay, so I think all the VAAI primitives are cool!  Say you create a virtual disk and want to use it right away.  Well, you'll have to wait a little bit since every block needs to have zeroes written to them.  Write_Same is cool because it not only offloads writing zeros, but the command will write patterns across sequential blocks.  You also get the eager or lazy zero capability.  Lazy zero will wait until the disks are accessed before it zeroes and eager zero, you got it, will zero the disks out right away!

To check the status and enable or disable Write_Same use the following commands at the CLI:

Status:

# esxcli system settings advanced list -o /DataMover/HardwareAcceleratedInit

Disable:

# esxcli system settings set -i 0 -o /DataMover/HardwareAcceleratedInit

Enable:

# esxcli system settings set -i 1 -o /DataMover/HardwareAcceleratedInit


ATS_Only
The neat thing about ATS_Only is with VMFS5 datastores, the default is ATS!  Do be careful with this one, please don't play in your production environment!  :-)
Status: 
# vmkfstools -Ph -v1 /vmfs/volumes/vaai_iscsi2
Disable:
# vmkfstools --configATSOnly 0 /dev/disks/<disk name>
Enable:
# vmkfstools --configATSOnly 1 /dev/disks/<disk name>

Yesterday I showed the GUI way to set ATS, XCOPY and Write_Same if you'd rather use the GUI.

Until Next Time!
-Brain

 

VAAI for Dummies - AKA VAAI for Me! - Part II - Where's the ON/OFF Switch??

Ahoy Ahoy,

Today I thought I'd do something a little different, instead of writing about a single feature in VAAI I thought I'd talk about something I struggled the most with, the on/off switch.  While researching for this blog I found this great blog written by Jason Langer!  Since VAAI is made up of a bundle of APIs for SAN and now for NAS there isn't a simple way to check to make sure everything is running, but I'm going to show you a few tricks that I hope will help!

Step 1.  Installing.

If you're running SAN and you're running a VAAI supported version of ESX or ESXi and your storage also supports VAAI, congratulations you've installed VAAI correctly!  HUH?!  Yep, for SAN it's already in there.  Okay, what about NAS?  Well, that's a bit more involved....

1. Go to VSC inside vCenter, and if you're not using NetApp, you should be able to get the plugin from your storage vendor.  Under Monitoring and Host Configuration, select the tools link.  At the bottom of the screen you'll see the NFS Plug-in for VMware VAAI.  Install the plug-in on your ESXi servers you want to have NAS VAAI functionality.

2.  Now lots make sure the plug-in was installed correctly.  Log onto your ESXi machine and type:
# esxcli software vib list | grep NetApp
NetAppNasPlugin                1.0-018                             NetApp  VMwareAccepted    2013-02-21

If you don't see the plug-in, something went wrong.  Remember, you need to reboot your ESXi host, but not the NetApp controller.

3.  Awesome, both SAN and NAS are installed and ready to go!  Well, sort of....  We now have to enable VAAI on the controller for NFS.  For both 7-Mode and Clustered ONTAP, we enable VAAI at the CLI.
      7-Mode:  options nfs.vstorage.enable on
      cDOT:  vserver nfs modify –vserver vserver_name -vstorage enabled

4.  Outstanding, now your NetApp is ready!  So you're ready right?!  Well, maybe....  There's a few settings that should be ready to go, but let's double check, just in case.

5.  Log into vCenter and click on one of your ESXi servers.  Select Configuration and than the Advanced Settings link under Software.  Now check for "DataMover" and "VMFS3".  Check to make sure these three settings are set to "1".  If they're not, some of the VAAI functions aren't going to work.

And I haven't forgotten about my CLI fans.  If you don't want to check in the GUI, go to the CLI and type:
# esxcli system settings advanced list -o /DataMover/HardwareAcceleratedMove
# esxcli system settings advanced list -o /DataMover/HardwareAcceleratedInit
# esxcli system settings advanced list -o /VMFS3/HardwareAcceleratedLocking

Look for a value of   "Int Value: 1", that means it's enabled.

6.  Okay so now we're ready right?!  Well sorta...  Couple more things to check.  Let's make sure the storage devices are VAAI ready.  Go back to your CLI window and type:
 # esxcli storage core device list

This will give you a full list of all your devices attached to your ESXi box.  Grab the "naa" identifier of one of your NetApp devices and type:
 # esxcli storage core device vaai status get -d naa.60a9800032466635635d414c45554356
naa.60a9800032466635635d414c45554356
   VAAI Plugin Name: VMW_VAAIP_NETAPP
   ATS Status: supported
   Clone Status: supported
   Zero Status: supported
   Delete Status: supported

How about ATS-Only?(It's a new feature I'll cover in a later blog)  Type: (where vaai_iscsi2 is the name of your datastore you want to check)
 # vmkfstools -Ph -v1 /vmfs/volumes/vaai_iscsi2
 VMFS-5.58 file system spanning 1 partitions.
File system label (if any): vaai_iscsi2
Mode: public ATS-only
Capacity 100 GB, 99.1 GB available, file block size 1 MB
Volume Creation Time: Thu Apr 11 20:48:33 2013
Files (max/free): 130000/129992
Ptr Blocks (max/free): 64512/64496
Sub Blocks (max/free): 32000/32000
Secondary Ptr Blocks (max/free): 256/256
File Blocks (overcommit/used/overcommit %): 0/971/0
Ptr Blocks  (overcommit/used/overcommit %): 0/16/0
Sub Blocks  (overcommit/used/overcommit %): 0/0/0
UUID: 516721a1-dd91425c-ee36-00c0dd1bcac4
Partitions spanned (on "lvm"):
        naa.60a9800032466635635d414c45554356:1
Is Native Snapshot Capable: YES
OBJLIB-LIB : ObjLib cleanup done.

Excellent, looking great!  Functionality is listed as supported, ATS-Only is set, let's just check one more thing inside the GUI and away we'll go!

7.  Log into vCenter and click on an ESXi server and select Configuration > Storage Adapters.  Select the storage you want to check, in this case iSCSI, and look at the bottom of the screen.  As shown here Hardware Acceleration is listed as "Supported".

8.  Now head to VSC in vCenter and under Monitoring and Host Configuration select Overview.  Take a look at the VAAI Capable column.

Congratulations, you're good to go!  Remember to check the functions of your storage, because some of the VAAI functions might not be enabled for your storage vendor.  In another blog I'll show you how to use ESXTOP so you can see that VAAI is actually working. :-)

Enjoy!
-Brain